During the second quarter of this year (2Q23), African airlines, for the second quarter in a row, saw the world’s second highest year-on-year passenger traffic growth rate, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) has reported in its 'Air Transport Chartbook – Q2 2023'. (IATA is the global representative body for the airline industry.) Only Asia-Pacific airlines recorded higher growth.

African airlines saw their passenger traffic jump by 38.9% in 2Q23, year-on-year. This was 0.8 percentage points greater than the figure for the sector as a whole. However, African carriers have still not fully recovered from the Covid-19 pandemic, with their 2Q23 passenger numbers being 9.2% below those for the pre-pandemic second quarter of 2019 (2Q19).

Regarding international passenger traffic on African airlines, in 2Q23 this was a “robust” 44% up, year-on-year. This was 4.5 percentage points above the average for the whole industry. But it was still 11.8% below its 2Q19 level.   

“These positive developments were mainly driven by the resilient recovery in international traffic on the Africa-Europe and Africa-Middle East route areas,” stated IATA in the Chartbook. “Passenger flows between Africa and Asia have also seen a significant ramp-up, closing the gap caused by past travel restrictions.”

Air ticket sales in Africa continued on an upward trend during 2Q23 and exceeded the global average during the weeks from mid-May to early June.

Regarding air cargo, the total carried by African airlines in 2Q23 was down, year-on-year, although only by 1.8%, but up 5.5% in comparison to 2Q19. African air cargo demand in 2Q23 nevertheless performed better than the global industry average. The main factor driving this demand was strong Africa-Asia air cargo demand in April and May.

African airlines are acquiring (buying and/or leasing) more new aircraft, which might signal that they anticipate a full recovery in demand by the end of this year. However, most of these new aircraft are going to only a few of the region’s carriers.

The African country which saw the strongest growth in passenger traffic in 2Q23, in comparison to 2Q19, was Nigeria, with a jump of 52%. Next came Egypt (33%), Ethiopia (31%) and Morocco (13%). For Tunisia, the increase was 5% and for Algeria, 3%. The only African country which recorded a demand in 2Q23 that was below its 2Q19 performance was South Africa, as a result, IATA stated, of its continuing economic challenges.

“Despite the continued positive performance [in 2Q23], the region still confronts economic challenges that severely limit the affordability of air travel, in addition to a range of infrastructure issues that curb capacity and hinder the development of consistent air services,” cautioned IATA.